#Employment #Workingworld
Hitting the headlines as they start to be put into use more
frequently, Account Freezing Orders ('AFOs') and
Unexplained Wealth Orders ('UWOs') were part of a set of
new (‘new’ at least in lawyers’ use of the word!)
powers introduced by the Criminal Finances Act 2017 aimed at
assisting the authorities investigate and seize ‘dirty’
money.
What are they?
In a nutshell, AFOs are civil orders that allow enforcement
authorities to freeze money in an individual's bank account
while they investigate the source of the funds and decide whether
to commence forfeiture proceedings. UWOs on the other hand are used
to compel an individual to explain their interest in a specific
property and the source of the wealth that was used to acquire it.
Failure to do so can lead to the property being seized by the
authorities.
